Table of Contents

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Student Achievement Study, 1970-1974 (ICPSR 7370)

Principal Investigator(s):International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement

Summary:

This study includes data collected between 1970-1974 by 21
national centers of the International Association for the Evaluation
of Educational Achievement (IEA), from a total of approximately
250,000 students, 50,000 teachers, and 10,000 schools in 19 different
countries. Students were tested on their achievement in six subject
areas: science, reading comprehension, literature, civic education,
and French and English as foreign languages. Between eight and 19
countries participated in each surve... (more info)

This study includes data collected between 1970-1974 by 21
national centers of the International Association for the Evaluation
of Educational Achievement (IEA), from a total of approximately
250,000 students, 50,000 teachers, and 10,000 schools in 19 different
countries. Students were tested on their achievement in six subject
areas: science, reading comprehension, literature, civic education,
and French and English as foreign languages. Between eight and 19
countries participated in each survey by testing students at one or
more of the following levels: 10-year-olds (Population I),
14-year-olds (Population II), and students in the last year of
pre-university schooling or programs of equivalent length (Population
IV). The countries included were Australia, Belgium, Chile, Finland,
France, West Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, India, Iran, Ireland,
Israel, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Romania, Sweden,
Thailand, and the United States. In addition to student achievement
data, each survey solicited information on the students' home and
socioeconomic backgrounds, interests, and attitudes. Information was
also gathered on characteristics of the teachers and participating
schools. In terms of timing, the survey was broken down in the
following stages: (1) Stage 1 (1966-1970), construction and pretesting
of instruments. (2) Stage 2 (1970-1973), fieldwork and analysis for
science, reading comprehension, and literature. (3) Stage 3
(1971-1974), fieldwork and analysis for civic education, English as a
foreign language, and French as a foreign language. (4) Data bank
(1973-1975), rebuilding of files and preparation of documentation for
archiving and distribution.

Access Notes

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Dataset(s)

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Study Description

Citation

International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement. Student Achievement Study, 1970-1974. ICPSR07370-v1. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 1977. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR07370.v1

Universe:
Targeted student populations: (1) All students aged 10 to
10 and 11 months at the time of testing, in participating countries
(Population I). (2) All students aged 14 to 14 and 11 months at the
time of testing, in participating countries (Population II). (3) All
students who were in the terminal year of university preparatory
programs or in secondary programs of the same length, regardless of
age (Population IV). For testing English and French as foreign
languages, these populations were further limited to those studying
the tested language. In addition, students in Population IV were
included in foreign language testing only if they had studied the
respective language for at least two years before the year of
testing. (4) A special subpopulation designated to include those
students in Population IV who, in terms of policies set by their own
system, could be regarded as specializing in science (Population
V). Teacher populations were determined as follows: (1) For Population
I, all teachers who were teaching students aged 10-11 or younger in
any school drawn for the Population I student sample. (2) For
Population II, all teachers in any school drawn for the Population II
student sample who were teaching one or more of the subjects to be
surveyed in that school. (3) For Population IV, all teachers in any
school drawn for the Population IV student sample who were teaching
one or more of the subjects to be surveyed in that school.

Data Types:
survey data

Data Collection Notes:

Due to the magnitude of the study, interested users
should request the introductory report that describes all files and
read the corresponding codebook prior to submitting an order.

Methodology

Sample:
The IEA-recommended sample design was a two-stage
stratified probability sample, with schools as the primary sampling
unit and students as the secondary. In the first stage, schools were
to be selected from a frame identified by nationally relevant factors,
such as size, type of school, and region, with the aim to obtain 100
or more schools per national population so that between-school
analyses could be carried out. In the second stage, a sample of
students was drawn from each selected school. National centers
negotiated with the IEA international sampling referee a mutually
acceptable plan for sampling individual populations, taking into
account constraints imposed by local circumstances and limited
resources. As there is no complete and accurate account of sampling
deviations, data users should examine the data for signs of
bias. Demographic characteristics such as sex, father's occupation,
and parents' education levels can be used as marker variables in
comparisons with statistics drawn from other sources.

Data Source:

cognitive tests and self-enumerated questionnaires

Extent of Processing: ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of
disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major
statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to
these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection: